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More Discount Friday Gaming Deals

Due to the extreme popularity of PopCap's world-conquering Peggle, it will soon be illegal to not own a copy of this addictive little game for at least one of its many supported platforms. Those of you who haven't yet experienced the joy of PopCap's instant gratification funhouse needn't fear a midnight assasination by the Secret Peggle Police, though; this weekend on Steam--the frugal-friendly digital download marketplace--you can pick up both Peggle and its sequel, Peggle Nights, for a mere $9.99. Considering the first Peggle debuted on XBLA for this price alone, you really can't find a much better deal--that is, until next weekend, when Steam will inevitably have some new mind-blowing bargain available.

Posted Apr 10 2009, 02:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 1 comment(s)

Filed under: bob mackey, sales, steam, deals, recession, depression, economy, good old games

Discount Friday Gaming Deals

If you're a frugal--or in my case, incredibly cheap--gamer with a working PC, then you probably know that Friday is a very special day. Yes, in some cases, Friday is payday, but more importantly, the last day before the weekend always means amazing deals from Steam and Good Old Games, which both do an excellent job of getting me to buy games I won't have time to play until 2019. If you're willing to forego a cheap lunch or an expensive coffee, you may also find yourself with far too much gaming on your hands, as this week's bargains are especially sweet.

Posted Apr 03 2009, 06:30 PM by Bob Mackey with | with no comments

Filed under: tomb raider, tomb raider anniversary, bob mackey, steam, deals, good old games, broken sword

Steam Weekend Sales Will Save Us All (Money)

Some incredible numbers came out of the mouth of Valve co-founder Gabe Newell last night regarding those lovely Steam weekend sales that I spend way too much money on. What he shared could mean a lot for how we buy games in the future. In other words, how digital distribution will make gamer makers rich and gamers richer.

His key example was last weekend’s 50% discount on Left 4 Dead. I was apparently not the only human who bought the game at that price point—Newell revealed that sales of the game rose 3000 percent, bringing in more dollars for the game through the service than at any point in the game’s history—including launch. And it didn’t cannibalize retail, either.

Another unnamed game that was recently offered in a Steam sale saw its sales numbers jump 36000%. That’s a lot of percent! Has Valve stumbled on some kind of magical spell where everyone makes more money by charging less?

Posted Feb 19 2009, 12:00 PM by Joe Keiser with | with no comments

Filed under: valve, steam, joe keiser, team fortress 2, left 4 dead, money

Ridiculously Cheap Indie Gaming: The Impulse Weekend Sale

Forget about Steam for a minute. Right now, you need to pay attention to Stardock’s competing online store, Impulse.

Impulse has been, to be brutally honest, not particularly effective competition against Steam. The prices are either at parity or higher, the selection smaller. The one thing the service did have going for it was that most everything being sold there was 100% DRM-free: following purchase, you would only ever have to log on to Impulse to download updates.

Yeah, that’s a big selling point, but it’s always about price, isn’t it? Steam’s weekend sales have been, let’s say, aggressive—just last week they were offering every single X-Com game for five dollars. So it’s great to see Impulse baring teeth here at last. This weekend marks its first weekend sale, and one of the gems available is indie charmer Gish—normally $20, now just $4. And it’s not even the only good deal.

Posted Jan 16 2009, 04:00 PM by Joe Keiser with | with no comments

Filed under: stardock, sales, steam, joe keiser, indie, kudos 2, impulse, gish

Aquaria Is Cheap. Buy It, You Bums.

I'll admit that I used to have a few gaming prejudices that now fill me with a deep shame. For instance, until I bit the bullet and plunked down fifteen bucks for Jonathan Blow's Braid, paying more than ten bones for any game available exclusively as a digital download felt wrong somehow. This is exactly why I missed out on Bit Blot's underwater adventure, Aquaria, back when it was released late last year; I'd played and loved the demo, but the full game's price of thirty dollars was just a little too rich for my blood. The sad thing is, I probably would have forgotten about Aquaria forever if the game hadn't just come out on Steam for the low, low price of sixteen dollars. Now I can make amends for my former transgressions by purchasing my own copy, and getting all of you loyal 61FPS readers to grab one as well. Here's the game's trailer, if you need some convincing:

Unfortunately, the sale on Aquaria only lasts until the end of 2008, so you'd better scrape together some spare change while you can. Protip: you know those dudes in the Santa suits, ringing bells on street corners? They're literally rolling in quarters.

Related Links:

Now At Your Local Dollar Store: Half-Life
Google to Buy Valve?
GOG is Great

Posted Dec 18 2008, 06:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 3 comment(s)

Filed under: indie dev moment, bob mackey, pc games, sales, steam, indie, aquaria

Now At Your Local Dollar Store: Half-Life

It may be hard to believe, but Half-Life, the FPS that redefined its "shoot your way out of hell while grabbing card keys" genre, is already ten years old. Actually, since 1998 was such a monumental year of our little hobby, a hell of a lot of games turned 10 this year: Metal Gear Solid, Starcraft, Ocarina of Time, Gran Turismo, and quite a few I'm probably forgetting. But out of all of these titles, only Half-Life can be had in these frightening modern times for the low, low price of 98 cents. That's right; if you have a dollar in the bank and a Steam account, you can experience one of the best games ever made for less than the cost of most McDonald's menu items.

There's one catch, though; this deal is only good until this Friday at noon PST--after that, Half-Life reverts to its original Steam price of $9.99 (still a good price).

I'm not the biggest PC gamer of all time, but I have a gigantic man-crush on Steam. I didn't think much of the service until it allowed me to get the entire Orange Box plus a Half-Life version of Peggle for only 40 bucks last Fall. It also warmed my heart when I typed in the registration code on my 10 year-old Half-Life CD and found that Steam let me download it, and also every single product tangentially related to the first Half-Life for free. Now, if only there was a way to pry those old Bullfrog titles from the sticky hands of EA...

Posted Nov 20 2008, 11:00 AM by Bob Mackey with | with 1 comment(s)

Filed under: half-life, fps, bob mackey, pc games, steam, 1990s, 1998, deals

Google to Buy Valve?

Still a rumor, but what does this mean? Mashable's Stan Schroeder thinks its an odd choice, but the value of Steam would make it a worthwhile purchase.

With Steam, Valve has managed to do what no one else has: they’ve made it so easy and simple to download games that users are actually willing to pay for it even when they have a choice of pirating the same content for free.

Posted Sep 17 2008, 11:00 AM by Cole Stryker with | with no comments

Filed under: valve, half-life, cole stryker, google lively, google, steam, game developer's conference

about the blogger

John Constantine, our superhero, was raised by birds and then attended Penn State University. He is currently working on a novel about a fictional city that exists only in his mind. John has an astonishingly extensive knowledge of Scientology. Ultimately he would like to learn how to effectively use his brain. He continues to keep Wu-Tang's secret to himself.

Derrick Sanskrit is a self-professed geek in a variety of fields including typography, graphic design, comic books, music and cartoons. As a professional hipster graphic designer, his recent clients have included Nerve, Pitchfork and MoCCA, among others.

Amber Ahlborn - artist, writer, gamer and DigiPen survivor, she maintains a day job as a graphic artist. By night Amber moonlights as a professional Metroid Fanatic and keeps a metal suit in the closet just in case. Has lived in the state of Washington and insists that it really doesn't rain as much as everyone says it does.

Nadia Oxford is a housekeeping robot who was refurbished into a warrior when the world's need for justice was great. Now that the galaxy is at peace (give or take a conflict here or there), she works as a freelance writer for various sites and magazines. Based in Toronto, Nadia prizes the certificate from the Ministry of Health declaring her tick and rabies-free.

Bob Mackey is a grad student, writer, and cyborg, who uses the powerful girl-repelling nanomachines mad science grafted onto his body to allocate time towards interests of the nerd persuasion. He believes that complaining about things on the Internet is akin to the fine art of wine tasting, but with more spitting into buckets.

Joe Keiser has a programming degree from Johns Hopkins University, a tiny apartment in Brooklyn, and a fake toy guitar built in the hollowed-out shell of a real guitar. He writes about games and technology for a variety of outlets. One day he will stop doing this. The day after that, police will find his body under a collapsed pile of (formerly neatly alphabetized) collector's edition tchotchkes.

Cole Stryker is an American freelance writer living in York, England, where he resides with his archeologist wife. He writes for a travel company by day and argues about pop culture on the internet by night. Find him writing regularly here and here.

Peter Smith is like the lead character of Irwin Shaw's The 80-Yard Run, except less athletic. He considers himself very lucky to have this job. But it's a little premature to take "jack-off of all trades" off his resume. Besides writing, travelling, and painting houses, Pete plays guitar in a rock trio called The Aye-Ayes. He calls them a 'power pop' band, but they generally sound more like Motorhead on a drinking binge.